I bought this 15" Grizzly planer in August of 2020, and it's been working great so far. But you know how it goes, most tools could work better if it only had _____ (fill in the blank). In my case, I've needed to make a project a second or third time, and when this happens, it would be nice to have my work pieces end up all the same sizes as before. Well all that is going to change because I'm getting ready to install a Wixey DRO or Digital Read Out on my planer.
 

If you remember a few months ago, I added a Wixey DRO to my tablesaw and so far that's been working fantastic and I'm very happy with it. So I looked into what that same company had for a planer, and sure enough they had something. This unit is very similar to that of my tablesaw, as it uses all the same electronics, just a shorter scale.

To mount the digital read out, I'm going to drill and tap some threads which is no big deal. However, it did come with self-tapping screws but I won't be using them because I don't like the reduced thread engagement of those kinds of fasteners. I'll also have to find the best place to mount it and then I'll be calibrating it at the end.

Anyways, let's get started installing this unit.
 

The scale on this Wixey DRO is just like the one on my tablesaw. Notice the arrangement of lines in the long green area (scale). And notice the lines on the DRO below it. Those lines need to match when you install the DRO onto the scale so it will work correctly.
 

Next you have to install some brackets, which is the hardest part of this project. Now every planer is different, but I needed to find a place that the scale would not interfere with anything while I was adjusting the thickness. After looking at a few different spots, I settled on this location, which is on the exit side of the machine.
 

The top bracket is fastened to the movable cast iron table so I drilled and tapped the same size screws here as well. Side note: drilling and tapping cast iron is easy because it's very soft. I like to drill a smaller pilot hole first and then follow up with the correct size tap drill. 
 

Here is a better look at the bracket. This bracket can pivot and has lock-nuts to adjust the amount of tension you have. After looking for a good location to mount this unit, I decided to flip the bracket around because it gave me the best mounting option for my application. But I'll still need one more piece before I can mount it in place.
 

I made a second bracket out of aluminum to hold my DRO above. The two holes on the right will be used for the bracket on the DRO and the other two will be used to mount this bracket to the machine.
 

I found two holes already drilled and tapped on my machine and decided to use them. However, they were metric. This meant I had to dig through my small supply of metric fasteners but I found some that worked (gold color).